The statistical activity of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg is in compliance with the organic law of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg (23 December 1998 as amended) and the EU/ECB legislation concerning the activity of the bank as part of the European System of Central Banks.

Furthermore, the collection of statistical data for the fulfillment of tasks of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB) is carried out under Council Regulation (EC) No. 2533/98 of 23 November 1998 concerning the collection of statistical information by the European Central Bank, as amended publihsed in the Official Journal L 318 of 27 November 1998.

International reserves and foreign currency liquidity

Data are collected and published under the terms of the “Law of 23 December 1998 concerning the monetary status and the Central Bank of Luxembourg” (unofficial English translation). Article 32 of the Law stipulates that the Bank is authorized to collect the statistical data required to fulfill its tasks.

The Central Bank of Luxembourg publishes the data on the international reserves as a service to the public.

Data are compiled directly by Banque centrale du Luxembourg accounting department for the template presenting the reserve assets held by the Banque centrale du Luxembourg. The Trésorerie de l'Etat provides data for the template presenting the reserve assets held by the Government, when relevant.

Data sharing: Data are produced solely by the Banque centrale du Luxembourg, no input of another institution is required except few derived calculations carried out by the ECB.

At the European level and in compliance with the article 5 of the Statute of the ESCB and the ECB (Collection of statistical information) the Banque centrale du Luxembourg has regular exchange with the ECB and other national central banks of the ESCB in the collection of data of common interest.

The article 5 of the Statute of the ESCB and the ECB (Collection of statistical information) specifies: “In order to undertake the tasks of the ESCB, the ECB, assisted by the national central banks, shall collect the necessary statistical information either from the competent national authorities or directly from economic agents. The national central banks shall carry out, to the extent possible, the tasks described in Article 5.1.” The implemented procedures provide for an effective and timely data exchange.

At a national level data sharing and coordination are established among the Commission de surveillance du secteur financier (CSSF), the Commissariat aux assurances (CAA) and the Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques (STATEC) in compliance with the Article 33 (2) of the organic law of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg.

Article 33 (2) of the organic law of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg specifies that without prejudice to the rules of professional secrecy applicable to the ESCB, the foregoing paragraph shall not preclude exchanges of information required in the context of the ESCB or prevent the Central Bank from exchanging information, to the extent necessary for the performance of its tasks, with the Commission de surveillance du secteur financier, the Commissariat aux assurances (Insurance Commission) and the Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques (STATEC).

All statistics compiled by the Banque centrale du Luxembourg are subject to the same confidentiality regime as other national statistics.

Article 33 (1) of the organic law of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg stipulates that any member of the bodies of the Central Bank, its auditor and staff members who, even after the termination of their functions, disclose information acquired in the course of those duties, shall be liable to the penalties provided for in Article 458 of the Criminal Code.

Article 33 (2) of the organic law of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg specifies that without prejudice to the rules of professional secrecy applicable to the ESCB, the foregoing paragraph shall not preclude exchanges of information required in the context of the ESCB or prevent the Central Bank from exchanging information, to the extent necessary for the performance of its tasks, with the Commission de surveillance du secteur financier, the Commissariat aux assurances (Insurance Commission) and theInstitut national de la statistique et des études économiques (STATEC).

In general, public service staff is bound to professional secrecy regulations. On joining the Banque centrale du Luxembourg, staff is required to take note of these regulations and sign a confidentiality agreement. Violation of the confidentiality provisions can result in disciplinary measures and may lead to fines or prison sentence. The Banque centrale du Luxembourg has also appointed a Compliance Officer whose duties include oversight for the application of data security protocols to new electronic reporting initiatives.

International reserves and foreign currency liquidity

Individual data are subject to professional secrecy on the part of the Central Bank, as defined in Article 33 of the "Law of 23 December 1998 concerning the monetary status and the Central Bank of Luxembourg" (unofficial English translation).

The dissemination of the data must not allow the inference of individual data.

The Banque centrale du Luxembourg carefully considers response burden for its statistics. Descriptions and reporting instructions are provided to reporting agents on the website of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg.

In order to encourage and facilitate statistical reporting, the Banque centrale du Luxembourg attaches great importance to good and frequent direct contacts with respondents. This may also include seminars for reporting agents on reporting requirements and on the purpose of the data collections in order to ensure respondents’ cooperation. This also involves general guidance by phone and e-mail or physical meetings.

Human, facilities, computing and financing resources are adequate to collect, produce and disseminate the required statistics.

Computing resources are adequate to perform the required tasks. Computer applications (databases, reporting and analytical tools) are generally developed in-house by the dedicated section of the Information Technologies Department. Back-up systems protect the BCL's statistical series.

The launch of larger IT projects requires a project planning phase. This planning phase includes the development of a detailed staffing, procurement and project control plans. The emphasis of this initial phase is to have a very good understanding of how the IT project will be executed in order to ensure allocation of sufficient resources in the annual budgeting process

Resources are allocated through the BCL's general budgeting process, starting from the strategic goals of the Statistics Department, then reviewing the operational objectives and measures, and estimating the impact on personnel and other resources as well as on necessary investments.

The Banque centrale du Luxembourg internal finance and strategy department is responsible for the budget supervision and the strategic planning and management control. In accordance with the Organic Law of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg, the budget preparation is part of the multiannual planning pro­cess.

The Banque centrale du Luxembourg’s internal auditing department is in charge of the independent and objective assessment of the internal control system and its functioning. This department is also responsible for testing the accuracy and the efficiency of the work processes of the Money and Banking statistics Section.

The BCL's statistical activities are largely influenced by requirements and priority setting of the ECB/ESCB and EUROSTAT, as identified in the work programs of the respective statistical committees. Any new data collections that are required by the ECB, as one of the major data users, undergo a formal benefit/cost assessment, which has been agreed within the ESCB to ensure efficient use of resources.

The Statistics Department actively participates in numerous international and European working groups, which include representatives of other major data users such as the ECB, the European Commission, and other international organizations.

The Banque centrale du Luxembourg is a member of the Luxembourg Statistical system, and the Irving Fisher Committee on Central Bank Statistics and regularly participates in their meetings.The BCL website allows users to contact the statistical department for data requests or questions about methodological aspect. The analysis of users’ requests all the BCL to better identify the users’ statistical needs.

Since statistics have to follow the user needs, their requirements are being assessed regularly. If there are additional data needs, the respective statistics might be updated. Before new requirements in the area of monetary statistics are introduced, a formal merits and cost procedure is carried out. Those requirements with a reasonable merits-costs-relation are implemented in the most efficient and less burdensome way.

The importance of the quality of statistical data is emphasized and promoted both internally and externally by the Banque centrale du Luxembourg. The Banque centrale du Luxembourg stress the importance of the quality of the data transmitted by the reporting agents and encourages the reporting agents to submit the data to the verification rules, detailed in a technical documentation, before their transmission.

As a member of the ESCB, the Banque centrale du Luxembourg shares the mission, strategic intent, and organizational principles of the ESCB. Among other things, strategic guidelines highlight the importance that the ESCB attaches to credibility, trust, transparency, and accountability in fulfilling its tasks. The mission statement, strategic intent, and organizational principles of the Eurosystem have been distributed to all staff and are published by all ESCB members.

Staff training in statistics, both through formal courses and on-the-job training, highlights the importance of data quality. Staff are encouraged to suggest changes to current processes and statistical practice that may enhance the data quality. Staff and management are sensitive to all dimensions of data quality.

Internal task concerning the collection, production and dissemination of statistics are organized in such a way to assure that the quality standards are respected.

Furthermore, statistical checks have been set up within the ESCB in order to control the quality of the exchanged data. For example, the national Central Banks of the euro area member states receive regular quality reports from the ECB in order to challenge the exchanged data.

Many checks are performed at various levels of the process, both for the individual and aggregate data including logical coherence of accounting data, comparison between trends of the data, identification of outliers and coherence of balance sheet data. Furthermore, quality issues are always discussed and quality improvements identified during the ongoing monitoring process are explicitly addressed.

Data quality is explicitly reflected in the strategic goals of the Statistics Department. Management is aware of trade-offs among dimensions of quality, such as between consistency with other data sets and maintaining a regular and transparent revision schedule or between timeliness and accuracy. These trade-offs are taken into account when choices are made.

Trade-offs are also discussed at the level of the ECB’s Statistics Committee, which advises the ECB Council on guidelines for statistical production, and the Committee on Monetary, Financial, and Balance of Payments Statistics (CMFB), which assists the European Commission in developing and implementing statistical work programs.

Article 5 (2) of the organic law of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg establishes the central bank’s independence from other government authorities in exercising its powers, thereby guaranteeing, among other things, the absence of interference in respect of the compilation and dissemination of statistical information. This is further emphasized by the ECB and ESCB Statutes which stipulate that “when exercising the powers and carrying out the tasks and duties conferred upon them, neither the ECB nor a national central bank nor any member of their decision making bodies shall seek or take instructions from Community institutions or bodies, from any government of a Member State or from any other body. The Community institutions and bodies and governments of the Member States undertake to respect this principle and not to seek to influence the members of the decision making bodies of the ECB or of the national central banks in the performance of their tasks.”

Staff recruitment and promotion are based on relevant skills or expertise in statistics or in relevant subject matter fields. Training in methodology and compilation methods is provided to staff in formal courses by internal experts and through participation of qualified staff in courses and seminars offered by the IMF, the ECB, or other institutions. Formal training also includes participation of expert staff in external courses on specialist subject matters. On-the job training in methodological issues and compilation methods is considered equally important and provided on an on-going basis.

The Banque centrale du Luxembourg is actively involved in professional bodies and encourages staff to contribute to conferences and seminars of such bodies. All staff publications are subject to internal review and approval by a Committee designed for this purpose.

Staff in the BCL's Statistics Department are also actively involved in a number of international and regional committees, working groups and task forces.

Decisions on data sources and statistical techniques are guided by statistical considerations only. Choices of data sources and statistical techniques are made on the basis of statistical research, other countries’ experiences, and the guidelines of international and regional institutions, taking into account country-specific conditions and the benefit/cost of expanding statistical collections.

The Banque centrale du Luxembourg provides explanatory material to users to ensure that the statistical data disseminated are interpreted properly and therefore prevent misinterpretation or misuse of statistics. Additional guidelines are also provided on request. Annotations and table layouts are designed to prevent misinterpretations.

The Banque centrale du Luxembourg monitors media coverage of all its activities including statistics. The press service produces a daily press review accessible to all staff.

The organic law of the BCL, as well as additional information on its tasks, objectives, and organization, is provided on the BCL's website. Reporting forms, citations of the relevant legal texts underpinning the data collection, and the terms and conditions relating to the confidentiality of individually identifiable information are also accessible on the BCL's website.

The Protocol on the Statute of the ESCB and of the ECB, along with the texts of all other relevant EU and ECB regulations, is available on the ECB Internet website. All statistical publications of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg identify where users may obtain more information about the Banque centrale du Luxembourg and its statistical products. The street and postal addresses, telephone number, and the URL of its Internet address are provided.

The collection of statistical data for the fulfillment of tasks of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB) is carried out under Council Regulation (EC) No. 2533/98 of 23 November 1998 concerning the collection of statistical information by the European Central Bank.

The Official Journal is published in all official languages of the European Union (EU).

Ethical standards for staff behaviour are part of the staff contracts or the personnel statutes for employees and civil servants, respectively. These include, in particular, rules on secrecy and on the acceptance of gifts and rewards. Further internal ethical guidelines exist to prevent corruption and to advise staff on correct behaviour outside of the office in order to maintain the reputation of the institution. To ensure staff compliance with rules for financial transactions (i.e., on insider trading), a special appointee (Compliance officer) has been nominated by the BCL. There is a Code of Conduct for the members of the Executive Board and the staff of the BCL.The Code of Conduct sets out the basic principles for correct staff behaviour and give more precise guidance for specific situations with potential conflict of interest. The general principles that apply enable board members and staff to perform their duties independently, impartially, and selflessly.

The reserve assets must:(i) be under the effective control of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg; and (ii) refer to highly liquid, marketable and creditworthy non-euro area currency-denominated claims on non-residents of the euro area as well as gold, special drawing rights and the reserve positions in the IMF of Luxembourg.

Deposits with banks located in Luxembourg and/or in other euro area Member States are therefore not considered as part of the official reserves

Data template on international reserves and foreign currency liquidity: Data are compiled in accordance with the guidelines International reserves and foreign currency liquidity: Guidelines for a Data Template of the IMF.

Instrument coverage: For the reserve assets the coverage is claims on non-euro area residents denominated in foreign currencies, monetary gold, SDRs and reserve position in the IMF. For other currency assets the coverage is claims of the central bank on euro-area residents in foreign currency and the liquid assets in foreign currency of the central government.

Valuation and conversion rates: The valuation is based on market prices by using the closing mid-market prices at the end of the appropriate period for stocks. For the data of the central government sector,holdings (when relevant) are valued at the closing mid-market prices at the end of the appropriate period.

As from 1999, the value of gold holdings is based on market value and disseminated on a monthly basis.

The conversion of foreign currency-denominated assets into Euro is based on the mid-point foreign exchange rate on the last day of the reference period. For the data of the central government sector the conversion into the Euro is based on the mid-point foreign exchange rate of the last day of the reference period.

Frequency of calculation and revaluation: Reserve assets are calculated on a monthly basis. The figures are revalued on a monthly basis to meet the b.o.p./i.i.p. standards and to take into account the accruals principle.

Reserve assets are compiled on a gross basis without any netting of reserve-related liabilities (with the exception of those reserve assets included in the sub-item of financial derivatives, which are recorded on a net basis).

All reversible gold transactions are treated as collateralized loans and recorded accordingly in the national reserves statistics.

Monthly data are disseminated in time series format for the current and previous year for the total and the main components of the BCL official international reserves: gold (in value and weight), SDRs, reserve position in the Fund, foreign exchange and other foreign assets.

Gross official reserves: Data are disseminated in EUR and cover gross official reserves of Luxembourg broken down by its major components: monetary gold, foreign assets, SDRs and reserve position in the Fund (IMF). As from 1999, the value of gold holdings is based on market value and disseminated on a monthly basis. Data are based on the information available for statistical purposes provided by the accounting department of Banque centrale du Luxembourg.

Data are compiled in accordance with the fifth edition of the IMF's "Balance of Payments Manual"

All tables are presented in French and English

Data template on international reserves and foreign currency liquidity : Data are compiled in accordance with the guidelines “International reserves and foreign currency liquidity” of the IMF

An advance release calendar is available on the website of the Banque Centrale du Luxembourg (BCL)

An advance release calendar that provides one-quarter-ahead notice of the release dates is published on the website of STATEC (Institut de la statistique et des études économiques du Grand-Duché du Luxembourg).

Detailed procedures and manuals of the Banque centrale du Luxembourg are maintained, and information from these manuals is provided on request.

The required statistical information is specified in the Guideline No 2004/15 of the European Central Bank of 16 July 2004 on the statistical requirements of the European Central Bank in the field of balance of payments statistics, the international reserves template and international investment position.

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